Online Writing and Poetry: Spread the Message

Online Writing - The Need to Diversify

When I first began writing online around 13 years ago, it was normal to start your own blog or choose one of a number of content writing sites such as HubPages, Bubblews, Squidoo, Reddit etc. and put all your work in that basket. Google was friendlier and it was possible to earn good money on these in addition to having a platform on which to store your writing.

Over the years things have changed, and some of these sites have disappeared, while others like Medium, Wattpad, and FanStory have arisen to take their place. Google has also had many updates and algorithm changes over the years and this has resulted in a downgrade in the importance that Google gives to sites like HubPages, and consequently a significant drop in earning potential.

For this reason it is now important that writers diversify and spread their writing over a few different websites. I currently write on HubPages, Medium, The Creative Exiles, All Poetry, have my own blogs, as well as offering freelance writing services through Fiverr.

What type of writing you do, and your niche (if any) may determine which sites you submit your writing to, but I feel it is important to have more than one string in your writing bow.

A synonym is a word you use when you can’t spell the other one.

— Baltasar Gracián

Would You Wear a Tuxedo to the Beach?

Most writers have a message

that they want to convey.

But if you have no audience

is it just a wasted fray?

Poets choose the perfect words

that rhyme, inform, and flow,

but if our poems aren’t even read

no one will ever know.

So, write to suit your interests,

to entertain yourself,

in case your poems attract no views,

and your book’s left on the shelf.

Some writers like to lecture

how we should think and act,

hold their followers to account,

and tell them what they lack.

I try to leave out the parts that people skip.

— Elmore Leonard

No wonder they’ve few followers

or readers of their work.

It’s just like preaching sermons

to an empty parish church.

They need a wider viewership,

who haven’t read it all before,

because a captured audience

gets very quickly bored.

If you write to make money,

diversity’s the key.

There are so many writing sites,

so set your writing free.

Spread your writing here and there,

don’t write on just one site.

Would you wear a tuxedo to the beach,

or sunglasses at night?

I love deadlines. I like the whooshing sound they make as they fly by.

— Douglas Adams

© 2023 John Hansen